Highland Council To Debate Another 5 Years Of Cuts

28th June 2017

Highland council will hear from the finance director Derek Yule on Thursday 29th June 2017 when he speaks on his paper "Financial Outlook 2018 - 2023".

The outlook for council finances as set out in the paper Financial Outlook 2018 - 2023 is for five years of cuts and reductions in services as the forecast is for reduction in grant income of 2%, 3.5% or 5% which would produce a budget gap of £129 million to £187 million over 5 years.

The council has already seen significant reduction being made in recent years so this will certainly make life more difficult to achieve balance budgets while delivering core services. There are many variables but reductions in government grants are a major factor when in the past grants tended to increase.

The council meeting can be viewed online on Thursday at https://highland.public-i.tv/core/portal/webcast_interactive/264903

The meeting starts at 10.35am and the Financial Outlook paper is item 9 on the agenda.

To read more about the challenges faced by councils in Scotland see the papers at -

Local Government in Scotland - Performance and challenges 2017

Financial Overview 2016

Highland council has been addressing the issues in several ways and one major initiative has been the setting up of a Redesign Board in 2016. An update is being brought to the council on 29th June and the paper on this can be found at -

Redesign proposals for operating more commercially and widening democratic and community participation

See Redesign Board papers